National Register
American Beach Historic District
Nassau County, FL
Listed: 01/28/2002
American Beach is nominated to the National Register for significance at the local level under Criterion A in the areas of Ethnic Heritage: Black, and Community Planning and Development. The Pension Bureau of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company developed American Beach as an ocean front resort for African-Americans. The company acquired the property in three parcels between 1935 and 1946. In addition to providing an open pavilion for company outings, and guest houses for company officials and employees, the Pension Bureau under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln Lewis had the parcels subdivided into lots to be sold for vacation homes. Around 125 acres of the platted sections of American Beach were eventually developed. American Beach meets Criterion Consideration G as the largest of several segregated beaches that developed in Florida as a result of legislated segregation that lasted until the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the initial effects of which were felt in American Beach in 1965. The period of significance therefore, is 1935-1965. American Beach was the most prominent of the Florida segregated beaches; was the most extensively developed; and retains the greatest concentration of historic resources of Florida's Black beaches.
American Beach was created as a very specialized community; a segregated planned beach resort. It thrived as one of the premier such resorts until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the social changes that followed. Despite these social changes, the harsh coastal environment, and local developmental and economic pressures on the community, it survives with a high degree of physical integrity and its unique environmental setting is intact. The historic resources associated with other such beach resorts have largely been lost to similar pressures, making the American Beach community uniquely associated with and representative of an earlier period of African American life.
American Beach Historic District
Nassau County, FL
Listed: 01/28/2002
American Beach is nominated to the National Register for significance at the local level under Criterion A in the areas of Ethnic Heritage: Black, and Community Planning and Development. The Pension Bureau of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company developed American Beach as an ocean front resort for African-Americans. The company acquired the property in three parcels between 1935 and 1946. In addition to providing an open pavilion for company outings, and guest houses for company officials and employees, the Pension Bureau under the leadership of Abraham Lincoln Lewis had the parcels subdivided into lots to be sold for vacation homes. Around 125 acres of the platted sections of American Beach were eventually developed. American Beach meets Criterion Consideration G as the largest of several segregated beaches that developed in Florida as a result of legislated segregation that lasted until the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the initial effects of which were felt in American Beach in 1965. The period of significance therefore, is 1935-1965. American Beach was the most prominent of the Florida segregated beaches; was the most extensively developed; and retains the greatest concentration of historic resources of Florida's Black beaches.
American Beach was created as a very specialized community; a segregated planned beach resort. It thrived as one of the premier such resorts until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the social changes that followed. Despite these social changes, the harsh coastal environment, and local developmental and economic pressures on the community, it survives with a high degree of physical integrity and its unique environmental setting is intact. The historic resources associated with other such beach resorts have largely been lost to similar pressures, making the American Beach community uniquely associated with and representative of an earlier period of African American life.